This application, and the innovations and related subject matter disclosed herein, (collectively referred to as the “disclosure”) generally concern automatically configurable wireless systems, such as, for example, automatically configurable wireless media systems. In particular, but not exclusively, disclosed innovations pertain to methods of wirelessly connecting loudspeakers to sources of audio media and/or other loudspeakers, as well as to tangible, non-transient computer-readable media containing instructions that, when executed, cause a computing environment to perform such methods. In addition, specific embodiments of loudspeaker systems configured to wirelessly connect to a source of audio media and/or to other loudspeaker systems are also described. Although principles pertaining to automatically configurable wireless systems are described in relation to specific examples of wireless media systems, other embodiments of wireless systems can incorporate one or more of the disclosed principles without departing from the scope and the spirit of this disclosure. Such systems include, by way of example and not limitation, keyless entry systems, wireless multi-media systems, wireless biological monitoring systems, wireless gaming systems, wireless control systems, and so on.
Near Field Communication (NFC) is a standards-based connectivity technology that permits different computing environments, e.g., mobile wireless devices, point-of-sale systems, etc., to establish a two-way radio communication with each other when the computing environments are positioned in relatively close proximity to each other (i.e., less than several centimeters (cm), such as less than about 3 cm to about 4 cm, for example, less than about 2 cm and about 3 cm apart, with between about 0.5 cm and about 1.5 cm being but one particular example).
NFC standards pertain to communications protocols and data exchange formats, and are based on existing radio-frequency identification (RFID) standards including ISO/IEC 14443 and FeliCa. The standards include ISO/IEC 18092 and those defined by the NFC Forum.
Existing implementations of peer-to-peer NFC connections are convoluted and require substantial processing and memory resources. As a consequence, existing peer-to-peer NFC connections consume substantial amounts of power to service various types of NFC devices, including smartphones, point of sale payment systems, etc. Such methods are not conducive for small, embedded systems powered by battery, or other small embedded systems lacking a monolithic operating system software.
Thus, a need remains for a simplified approach for wirelessly and operatively coupling computing environments with each other using NFC or other communication protocols. There also remains a need for methods of wirelessly connecting loudspeakers to sources of audio media and/or other loudspeakers. In particular, but not exclusively, a need remains for wirelessly connecting independent loudspeakers to respective multi-channel audio sources. A need also remains for systems configured to wirelessly connect a plurality of independently operable loudspeakers to a single multi-channel audio source. Other deficiencies of existing technologies exist, as well; the foregoing list of deficiencies is intended to be a listing of several representative deficiencies in the prior art rather than an exhaustive listing.